Media Advisory: Mickey Rooney recognized at the National Portrait Gallery

Portrait of Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland by Harold E. Edgerton on view

Tuesday, April 8, 2014 -

National Portrait Gallery

Eighth and G streets N.W.

First-floor gallery

Today the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery has installed a photograph of American entertainer Mickey Rooney with frequent co-star Judy Garland. The photograph was created by Harold E. Edgerton in 1939. It will be on view in a first-floor space that is designated for remembrance of recently deceased people represented in the museum’s collection.

Born into a vaudeville family, Rooney took the stage as a toddler and began making movies at age five. Over the course of a 10-decade career, he made more than 300 films, ending with “The Muppets” (2011). “A Family Affair” (1937), the first of nearly 20 movies in the Andy Hardy series, launched Rooney as the top box-office star in 1939, 1940 and 1941; he also won a juvenile Academy Award for “Boys Town” (1938). Rooney and Garland co-starred in a series of highly popular movie musicals, including “Babes in Arms” (1939). “We weren’t just a team,” he said, “we were magic.”

Rooney’s films included “National Velvet” (1944), “Requiem for a Heavyweight” (1962), and “The Black Stallion” (1979). He received a Tony nomination for his exuberant performance with Ann Miller in “Sugar Babies” on Broadway (1979).